


The Courage of Stars

by LessonsFromMoths



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Adventure, Angst, Closure, Creepy, Derek heals, Derek is sad, Derek moves into a haunted house, Everyone is Dead, F/F, F/M, Ghosts, Grieving, Haunted House, Healing, M/M, Mystery, Songs, Violent Deaths, a bit of fluff though, and makes new friends, but makes sense because they're all ghosts, except Derek, major character deaths, okay so i lied only half of the people are dead, seriously there are a lot of ghosts, songs enhance reading experience
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-27
Updated: 2020-02-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:42:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,172
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21584758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LessonsFromMoths/pseuds/LessonsFromMoths
Summary: Derek moves to a new state, a new city, a new town. And into a house that might be just as haunted as he is.(AKA a lot of people are dead and ghosts and it's kind of fun and sad and healing for everyone.)
Relationships: Aiden/Lydia Martin, Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski, Scott McCall/Kira Yukimura, Stiles Stilinksi/OMC, Vernon Boyd/Erica Reyes
Comments: 34
Kudos: 43





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from the song "Saturn" by Sleeping at Last. 
> 
> This is a WIP but please feel free to contact me regarding the ending, as it may be triggering and unsatisfactory, depending on who is reading. End notes of every chapter will have possible triggers (as many as I can think of) and I'm sure I'll miss a few, so just let me know if you have any concerns. 
> 
> This story is meant to be read and listened to, as I will be providing songs with each chapter (sometimes in the middle of the chapter, sometimes at the beginning, and always a list at the end. Please feel free to listen! CHAPTER 1 WILL NOT HAVE ANY SONGS, AS IT IS MORE OF AN INTRO.
> 
> Again: half of the characters are dead. Please don't hate me! :)

This place is serene. It’s far from the rest of the town, just right outside of the bustle of the lazy city, and Derek falls in love with it all over again. The trees that surround his property give him the proper amount of privacy, and the way the wind rustles through their leaves and branches sounds like howling. It haunts him, and rightly so. Derek deserves it all. 

The house itself is so big that it feels like a shell. He wanders the rooms aimlessly, and each one has a different smell and feel to it. All of them except one feel occupied, and he likes that. It makes the place seem less sad. He checks out every single empty room, savoring the way the emptiness slowly fills him, almost giving him the feeling that he’s floating. Once he’s completely full, he floats to his room, the unoccupied one, and gives it its rightful occupant. His room has a single window that opens up to the front yard, where he can watch the trees wave at him from his driveway. 

The walls in the house are dark shiplap, reminding him of his grandmother’s house. The ceilings are high, the floors are a cool, dark wood. The whole house sighs every now and then. The floorboards are completely silent whenever he steps over them, despite their age, but they creak on their own. It’s been foreclosed on countless times, and it’s one of the things that drew Derek here in the first place. Abandoned, unwanted, unattainable. The house is perfect. 

Its outside is a perfect combination of decrepit and remodeled, as if someone tried to make it look better, but they ran out of money or resources, and eventually continued to let age overtake the old house. It’s been empty for so long that the thickets outside have overgrown the sagging front porch, and the inside has a thick layer of dust and cobwebs decorating it. Derek doesn’t mind much, just sees it as an opportunity to do something, a way to keep busy. 

He has no clue what he’s going to do in this tiny town of Beacon Hills. The insurance payout is large enough that he doesn’t have to work a day in his life again, despite how much this house cost, and he knows he might go crazy if he sits in the house all day. But that seems like a problem for another day. He’s been in the house for a few weeks, and so far, he’s perfectly fine with sitting on his front or back porch and watching the trees bend under the weight of the wind, lost in thought. Eventually, he’ll hate himself so much that he won’t be able to stay lost in his thoughts, but for now it’s working for him. 

He’s made a few trips into town to gather groceries and familiarize himself with the new place, though he doubts he’ll spend much time in town. People notice him and stare, and some even go as far as whisper. He’s used to that, and pretty good at ignoring it, but he gets a child loudly asking her mother if Derek is the one who moved into the haunted house in the woods, and that piques his interest. His house, haunted? He figures it’s one of those funny ghost stories that accumulate in small towns such as this one, and he’s not too worried...he just hopes it doesn’t bring daring middle and high school children to his doorstep, daring each other to ring the doorbell or take a step inside. The last thing Derek needs is kids bothering him all the time.

When he gets back to his house, he unloads his groceries and begins to put them away, but the little girl’s statement stays in the forefront of his mind. He feels eyes watching him from all directions, and shakes it off as being paranoid. Haunted houses and ghost stories were for children, and Derek will be damned if he lets them get to him.

As he goes to bed that night, he can’t shake the familiar feeling that his life is about to spiral, again. And he doesn’t like it one bit. It takes a long time for Derek to fall asleep. 

He starts seeing things. At first he thinks it’s because he hasn’t been getting enough sleep (four hours a night isn’t conducive to anyone’s mental state), then he writes it off as his mind playing tricks on him, just like it did right after the fire. It’s not like the things he’s seeing are very worrying, just blurry shapes and quick flashes of movement from the corner of his eye. The second he turns his head, nothing is there, and he shakes it off. 

It’s over two months after he moves into the house -- two months of his neighbors trying to get closer to him, two months of nonstop stares in town, two months of nothing but Derek and his own mind -- when his hallucinations upgrade to full figures. He’s making himself a lemon chicken dinner when he glances up and sees a little boy standing on the other side of the kitchen counter, hair crazed and curly, eyes wide. The child is staring at him curiously, his fingers curled over the counter as he peeks over it. Derek can barely see his nose peeking up from behind it, and when the child realizes that Derek is looking right at him, his ice blue eyes widen considerably and he runs off, socked feet carrying him quickly from the kitchen.

“Wait!” Derek yells at the child, beginning to run after him, before he stops dead in his tracks. The little boy’s footsteps made no sound. He sinks to the ground, back against the counter, and stares at the doorway through which the tiny child disappeared through. Those big blue eyes are burned into his own, and he knows that if he looks down, his hands will be shaking. To stop them, he brings them up to his temples and cradles his head. His mind is surprisingly blank, save one thought that continues circling his brain.

God, he would give anything to be able to call Laura right now.

He doesn’t see the little boy again, but he does see a girl with pale white skin and dark curls staring at him from the treeline of his backyard, cheeks gaunt. They’re making eye contact, and Derek feels chilled to the bone as they stare at each other from 50 yards away. He thinks about calling out to her, telling her how this is private property, but she gives him the same numb feeling as the child from the other day gave him, and he just watches her until she fades back into the trees.

It keeps happening, and at an elevated frequency. Derek sees flashes of people everywhere: a mop of dark hair in the basement; a cheek spotted with moles in the corner of a bedroom; a large man’s hand resting on a doorknob. He sees the child again less than a week later, and he honestly thinks he’s going crazy. 

Derek stays in a hotel, composing himself, before deciding that he’s being ridiculous and going back a few days later. He feels paranoid all the time, refusing to fall asleep until he passes out. He’s not sure what he’s afraid of, he just knows that what’s happening is unnatural. He nods to sleep at his kitchen table, wishing that he could talk to someone. Laura would know what to do. He can see her single raised eyebrow, lips quirked as she tells him how dumb he’s being. 

“Derek, there’s no such thing as ghosts,” she’d say. “But if there was, you could always try talking to them. God, it’s so typical. Out of everyone in the world, you’re the only one I would believe would move into a house more haunted than you are.”

So Derek takes mind-Laura’s advice and starts talking to them. 

“Um, hello,” he says out loud one day. He’s met with silence and stale air. Derek decides to give the talking a rest and begins making dinner, feeling awkward about the whole thing. “I like how easy it is to make chicken dishes,” he says quietly, moving the thawed chicken from his sink to his cutting board. He slices up two breasts, throwing them into a pan along with the vegetables and soy sauce for his stir fry. “Most days I don’t have enough energy.” He tosses the food in the pan. “I would just forego eating, which is even easier, but...I can’t let Laura down.” 

He pours the sizzling blend into a bowl over rice, sticks a fork into it, and grabs a napkin before turning around to sit at the table. He almost drops his bowl to the ground, because looking at him from a few feet away is the little boy. His eyes are curious again, hands twisting their way around a light green blanket. The kid has on a powder blue button-up jacket, and matching shorts. His socks come up all the way to his shorts, and Derek can see what looks like suspenders under the kid’s jacket. Derek isn’t much up-to-date on child’s fashion, but he doesn’t look like he just walked in from off the street.

“Who’s Laura?” The kid asks quietly, his voice soft and hesitant. Derek would melt a little, if he wasn’t so terrified. 

“My sister,” he forces out, his voice much softer than he intended.

“Is she coming to visit?” The little boy asks, perking up a little at the concept.

Derek swallows hard and shakes his head. “No. She’s gone.”

The little boy’s face scrunches up. “Why doesn’t she want to visit you? Where did she go?”

Derek tries to think out his answer, but he can’t filter himself. “She’s dead.” That’s the first time he’s ever said it out loud. It makes him feel numb.

“Oh,” the little boy says. “Like me.”

Derek feels himself pale. He had his options narrowed down, but hearing the child in front of him so blatantly admit to being dead is so much worse than he ever could have imagined. 

“Is she like me?” He continues. “Or is she in heaven?”

Derek feels his breath run ragged. “Does heaven even exist?” He asks, gripping his ceramic bowl so tightly that he’s surprised when it doesn’t break. 

The child shrugs. “I’ve stopped wondering,” he says in his high, little voice, and Derek feels an overwhelmingly strong urge to kneel down and wrap the child in his arms. He refrains, but the kid’s words, “I’ve stopped wondering,” bounce in his brain. 

“What’s your name?” Derek asks, making a move to kneel down at the kid’s level. 

“We can’t make it that easy on you,” a voice from behind him says, and if Derek’s fight or flight response was working correctly, he would have jumped. As it is, his heart rate increases considerably and he turns around slowly, scared about what he might find. 

The man standing there is about as tall as Derek himself, and has interesting clothes as well. His pants are sleek and tight, and striped. They’re yellow with brown stripes, and his shirt is a tight red to go with it. His pants go up above his waist, and a thick belt holds them in place. He wears brown dress shoes to match. His face, though, is captivating. He has a terrifyingly impish grin on his face, an upturned nose, and moles dotting his pale complexion. Derek stares at him in mild terror, wondering what his next move should be. 

“Talk to us again once you’re more informed,” the man says in his lilting voice, and he holds out his hand to the child. “Come along, now,” he says, and the kid takes his hand. The second he does, they both disappear, and Derek’s once again standing alone in his kitchen.

Or, at least, he thinks he is.


	2. Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome back! I really appreciated the encouraging comments on my first chapter, and it was hard to keep from posting this one immediately! 
> 
> I hope you enjoy Derek's further fumbling into the world of...otherworldly.

It takes Derek some searching (so much so that he almost asks for directions), but he finally finds the Beacon Hills library. He hopes they don’t ask for a library card as he searches the internet on one of the computers furthest away from other people. He has a feeling they don’t want to know what he’s looking up. Luckily, no one pays him much attention, all of them too invested in their own stuff to care about his. He boots up chrome and then stares at the google homepage, wondering where to start. He decides to start by typing in their current county, adding “child deaths” to it. Not much comes up, just some obituaries where they mention children of the deceased. 

He tries again, adding the words murder, domestic, and adolescent to his next few searches. He finds a website that mentions a list of murdered American children, and somewhere in the article is the name of his county. He clicks on it, and skims through it all, trying to find it. He only finds one entry for his county, way up near the top: one of the twenty deaths listed under the 1960s. The date of death is July 14th, 1966. The victim's name is Isaac Lahey, and his age is recorded as 7. The status of the case is listed as solved. Like all of the names on the list, Isaac’s is hyperlinked, and Derek clicks it. It leads to a Wikipedia page for Isaac. Derek’s eyes are immediately drawn to what looks like a school picture of a young child, and his blood runs cold when he recognizes it as the child who was in his kitchen. He quickly begins to read the article.

[Isaac's Song: Fourth of July](https://youtu.be/JTeKpWp8Psw)

Isaac Lahey, beaten to death by his father, John Lahey, when he was 7 years old. His case was mentioned on an episode of Forensic Files, which was why there were a few pictures and more information than Derek wanted. Isaac’s body was dumped in the woods by Derek’s house, which used to be the Lahey house, and when it was found they identified the boot marks on Isaac’s body to be matching a pair his father owned. His father confessed to the murder, and John Lahey spent the rest of his life in prison. Isaac’s older brother, Camden, was detrimental in the sentencing, as he recounted brutally the ways their father would lash out at the two boys. Camden witnessed his father killing his brother, and the judge was so moved that he vowed to never let John Lahey see the outside of bars again. And he kept his word.

Derek clicks out of all the chrome pages, feeling sick. He can imagine little Isaac, eyes so wide and innocent, getting beaten down by life over and over again, his perfect little figure bent in pain, his cheeks tearstained, his tiny hands clenched in tinier fists. He puts his head in his hands and breathes in and out for a few moments. Okay. So Isaac was one ghost in his house. But who was the other one from the kitchen? Or the boy with the floppy hair? Or the girl in the backyard? Or the owner of the big hand?

He clicks back into chrome, and decides to type in the property along with the word “deaths.” Another website pops up, this one called Died In House. He types in his address, and a page comes up prompting him to pay $12 for the results. He types in his information and hits enter. It takes a second, but eventually he gets a formal-looking report. 

Official DiedInHouse Report

DiedInHouse **found** information relating to a death at this address:

Date run: September 1, 2019  
Address: 591 Eastwood Drive, Beacon Hills, CA  
Deaths occurred at this address: 7  
People associated with this address: 23  
Other types of information found: None

**Details on deaths at 591 Eastwood Drive, Beacon Hills, CA**

There are 7 people that may have died at this address. We found:  
**Name:** Isaac Lahey  
**Birth Date:** September 22, 1959  
**Death Date:** July 14th, 1966  
**Manner of Death:** Homicide

 **Name:** Mieczyslaw Stilinski  
**Birth Date:** April 8, 1947  
**Death Date:** December 24th, 1972  
**Manner of Death:** Homicide

 **Name:** Allison Argent  
**Birth Date:** March 19, 1964  
**Death Date:** October 5, 1982  
**Manner of Death:** Accident

 **Name:** Lydia Martin  
**Birth Date:** November 22, 1961  
**Death Date:** August 12, 1989  
**Manner of Death:** Homicide

 **Name:** Jackson Whittemore  
**Birth Date:** June 15, 1973  
**Death Date:** June 16, 1995  
**Manner of Death:** Accident

 **Name:** Scott McCall  
**Birth Date:** October 6, 1985  
**Death Date:** February 12, 2010  
**Manner of Death:** Homicide

 **Name:** Vernon Boyd, III  
**Birth Date:** January 30, 1996  
**Death Date:** October 5, 2014  
**Manner of Death:** Suicide 

Derek stares dumbly at the report, then tries to send it to the library printer. He gets a pop-up that informs him that he needs a library card so that they can charge him 10 cents a page. On the website, each person has a small article under their name, a sort of ‘additional information,’ but Derek can’t bring himself to read them after Isaac’s. He debates looking up everyone and printing out their pages to read later. But...Is he willing to do that to himself? As he contemplates, he sees Isaac’s bright blue eyes staring at him from over his kitchen counter. 

Derek gets a library card.

[Earth](https://youtu.be/g1YQgjpnJdo)

When he gets back to his house -- their house -- Derek's greeted with a shiver and an unwavering feeling that someone is following him up his driveway. He turns around and is met with a hispanic-looking boy (man?) with swooping dark hair and a crooked jaw. Derek opens his mouth to speak -- he looks like he could be a neighbor coming to visit -- but the man’s intensity in his stare stops his words from coming out of his throat.

“So you’re the new owner,” the man finally says, breaking the silence. “Welcome to Eastwood Manor. Are you enjoying your time here?” His smile is teasing, but not unkind. 

Derek opens his mouth to reply, but stops when a gunshot rings out across the yard. The man in front of him jolts, and Derek almost screams when he realizes that there’s a blooming spot of red on the man’s white shirt. The spot grows until the bloodstain overtakes most of his shirt. There’s a distinctive, perfect circular hole in the t-shirt over the stain. The man’s face is impassive, though, as if this happens to him all the time. He just stares at Derek, unblinking.

Derek stares back, unsure of what to do. He’s quickly realizing that this is another ghost, and wonders which one this is: Mieczyslaw, Jackson, Scott, or Vernon. He doubts it’s the suicide, as the gunshot wound is in the middle of his chest, and the man doesn’t look very tortured. But then again, do ghosts look tortured over the decisions they made in life?

“Are you Scott?” He asks, taking a shot (it would be funny if he wasn't dead) in the dark. Scott was the easiest to say, if not the most likely. 

The ghost graces him with a real smile, his crooked jaw even more evident. “You’ve been doing your research. Did Stiles get on you about that?” 

Derek tilts his head. Stiles? Was Stiles someone that the report missed? 

Scott seems to notice his confusion. “Stilinski,” he supplies helpfully, and Derek gets it. Stiles is the nickname for Mieczyslaw. It’s much easier to say, anyway. Scott looks at him curiously. “You don’t talk much.” Derek shrugs. “Stiles is gonna like that.” Scott suddenly pauses, then gives Derek an apologetic shrug. “Gotta bounce. But I’m sure I’ll see you around,” he says. Derek blinks and Scott is gone. 

Apparently, the other spirits (Ghosts? Souls? Phantoms? Presences? Okay, Derek’s run out of synonyms) decided that Derek interacting with Scott was enough otherworldly contact for the day, and he’s able to make dinner and do laundry without any other interruptions. It makes him feel surprisingly on-edge and a little miffed as to why they decide to stop bothering him when he learns about them.

He sits at his kitchen table and pulls out Scott’s papers.

[In the Woods Somewhere](https://youtu.be/P6btN_cdLfE)

_BEACON HILLS, CA-February 12, 2010 -- The decedent was found in full arrest in his driveway, suffering from an apparent gunshot wound to the chest. Emergency services were dispatched by the decedent’s brother, and when CRAA Medics arrived, lifesaving measures were administered. There was spontaneous return of circulation, and the decedent was transported to Beacon Place Medical for further medical care. Surgery was attempted for repair, but the decedent’s condition declined. Brain death was pronounced. Per protocol, the coroner’s office was notified and the case was accepted. Following organ procurement, an autopsy was performed and the decedent was released to the funeral home of choice._

It doesn’t give much information except for the fact that Scott had a brother, so he shuffles to the next one. It’s an obituary. 

_Scott McCall, 25, of Beacon Hills, died February 12th, 2010 as a result of a senseless act. He was born October 6, 1985 in Beacon Place to Rafe and Melissa (Ponzio) McCall. He graduated from East Side High School in 2003 and from UCLA in 2007. He was in his third year of veterinary school at the University of California-Davis._

_Scott had a great love for every animal and person he met, and he was well-known for his crooked smile and kindness. He is survived by his parents Rafe and Melissa of Beacon Hills, his brother Liam, at home. He also leaves his paternal grandparents, Juan and Marisol McCall of San Diego. He is also survived by his girlfriend, Kira Yukimura, and his close friends Noah Patrick and Sydney Lewis._

_Funeral arrangements are being handled by the Dunbar Funeral Home in Beacon Place. Calling hours will be Wednesday from 2-4 and 7-9. The funeral will be held on Thursday at 9:30a.m. at the funeral home and at 10a.m. at Zion Lutheran Church in Beacon Place. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that you consider donations to the Youth ALIVE! Foundation, which serves organizations that give support to family members of homicide victims. Envelopes will be available at the funeral home and can also be mailed to the foundation._

Derek swallows and pulls out the last paper on Scott. It’s an online newspaper article. 

**25-YEAR-OLD KILLED IN DRIVE-BY SHOOTING IN OWN DRIVEWAY**

_BEACON HILLS -- A 25-year-old man, identified as Scott McCall of Beacon Place, was killed in a drive-by shooting in the neighborhood of Green Acres Friday morning, according to police._

_Beacon Hills police said McCall was getting out of his car in his family’s driveway when a green-colored SUV drove by the house and an unknown assailant inside the car fired shots._

_McCall was shot in the chest area and was sent to Beacon Place Hospital in critical condition, where he was pronounced dead._

_A green-colored SUV was seen fleeing southbound on 17th street toward the high school after firing shots._

_It is believed that the car McCall was driving resembles the vehicle of a high profile and known gang member, and the shot may have been intended for him instead._

_No one is in custody, and Beacon Hills Detectives are asking anyone with any information to come forward._

He feels sick after reading the articles, just like he did with Isaac. It would be so much easier to see the ghosts every day if they were awful people who deserved the deaths they got. But to see Isaac, so young and innocent, and Scott, so naive and faultless, died so senselessly do nothing to remind Derek that life is fair. They both had their lives ahead of them. He wonders if the senselessness of their deaths is why they’re still here, wandering the property they lived and died on.

Derek wakes up because of the feeling of blood rushing to his head, and his eyes snap open. He opens his mouth to scream, but the sound gets stuck in his throat. From what he can tell, he’s suspended over the banister on his second floor. His feet aren’t touching anything, and neither are his arms. The floor is impending, and it reminds him of when he was little, playing superheroes with Laura and Cora and jumping down the stairs over and over again. He doesn’t even have time to blink when he begins rushing towards the ground. 

He’s finally able to scream.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> POSSIBLE TRIGGERS: child abuse, obituaries (?) 
> 
> As promised, song summary:
> 
> [Fourth of July](https://youtu.be/JTeKpWp8Psw) by Sufjan Stevens, illustrates Isaac's innocence. _"Did you get enough love, my little dove?"_
> 
> [Earth](https://youtu.be/g1YQgjpnJdo) by Sleeping at Last. Derek trying to come to terms with everything. _"Fault lines tremble underneath my glass house but I put it out of my mind."_
> 
> [In the Woods Somewhere](https://youtu.be/P6btN_cdLfE) by Hozier. This is what I assume Scott saw when he died. A forest, a creature in need, and complete loneliness. _"Forgot all prayers of joining you, I clutched my life and wished it kept."_


	3. Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There has been so much kindness in response to this story and I appreciate it so much! 
> 
> I hope you all continue to enjoy it!

A few hours later he’s back at the house, arm wrapped from pinkie to shoulder, slung up and throbbing despite the pain meds. The house is eerily silent. The wind has stopped dead and it feels like the whole house is waiting. Derek shoots his eyes to the oven clock. 3am. He knows he won’t be able to fall asleep again tonight, so he pulls out the kitchen chair and throws himself down into it, rubbing his face tiredly with his non-casted hand. 

After what could have been five minutes but could’ve been an hour, Derek feels someone’s eyes on him and he looks up. Isaac is standing there, large blue eyes staring widely at him. 

“Hello, Isaac,” Derek says after a few minutes, voice hoarse and tired. 

“Hello,” Isaac says back. He stares curiously at Derek’s arm. “Does it hurt?” He whispers. Derek nods. “Someone should sign your cast. People always signed my casts,” Isaac says softly. 

Derek swallows hard, remembering why Isaac had to have casts. “I’ll get right on that,” he croaks. 

“Jackson isn’t always nice,” Isaac continues, voice still painfully soft. “When he hurts, he hurts people.”

Derek nods slowly, then shuffles through the papers in front of him to produce the one that says Jackson Whittemore on it. He had only found one article when he was printing them out, an obituary. 

_BEACON HILLS - On June 16, 1995, one day after his birthday, our son, Jackson Whittemore, passed away due to a drug overdose. He was 22 years old. Jackson was bright and had a lot of friends throughout his life, and his battle with drug abuse consumed his life. We believe he is finally at peace._

_Jackson is survived by his parents, David and Katherine Whittemore, and his closest friend, Daniel Mahealani. He was preceded in death by his birth parents, Gordon and Margaret Miller. We wish him a safe journey. A Memorial Service will be held at a later date._

Derek’s heart twinges as he’s reminded of his Uncle Peter, of his slow and painful death, and imagines that Jackson’s must have been similar. As Derek skims the article again, he finds that he can’t be filled with any kind of rage or contempt for this spirit that apparently threw him off of his own balcony. He just feels pity.

When he looks up again, the man with yellow and brown striped pants is standing behind Isaac, one large hand resting on Isaac’s tiny shoulder. He carefully steps around Isaac and approached Derek at the table, steps silent and face blank. He reaches out and brushes his fingers against Derek’s cast. Derek stares as the man’s fingers pass right through. He looks up and the man’s face is soft, more open than not. Derek watches as the man flutters his hands around his cast, chewing on his bottom lip with concentration. 

“I’m sorry he did this to you,” the man murmurs, still not looking at Derek directly. His fingers continue their incessant fluttering. Derek’s mouth feels too dry to speak. “I know it’s no excuse, but I’m sure you understand what today is, you know?” Derek tries to count the days in his head. When was it that he moved here? January? December? He can’t recall. Then his eyes slide to Jackson’s obituary. Oh. It must be June. He wonders which day it is, Jackson’s anniversary of birth or anniversary of death. 

“Once he’s calmed down, he has a favor to ask of you,” the man says softly, and Derek looks up at him, startled. What favor could Jackson’s ghost possibly want? The man pulls away. “Are you okay here for now? Isaac will stay.” Derek sees the tiny ghost standing on the corner of the kitchen, clutching his green blanket. He nods. “I’ll be back soon. Goodbye, Derek.”

The man disappears, the sound of a sigh following him. 

[Jackson's Song to Danny: Videotape](https://youtu.be/-0ZECWpnQNQ)

He doesn’t sleep at all, and Derek is pretty sure that he looks like a complete maniac standing on the front porch of 2001 West Jade Boulevard in Beacon Place. He had taken an uber for the first time from his place and to the house (thanks new laptop and wifi router!), because he doesn’t think that he can manage his car with his arm fucked up like it is. The drive to the hospital had been painful enough. Jackson had approached him an hour before, Stiles and Isaac hovering, as he asked Derek for this favor. As his day of death, Derek figures he can do this one thing for the kid, even though talking to people is the thing Derek hates the most. 

He takes a deep breath and checks to make sure the addresses match again. They do. He shoves the slip of paper into his back pocket (and he’s still wearing his pajama pants and shirt from the ER -- he can’t imagine how hard changing is going to be for the next few months, oh god) and knocks on the door before he can talk himself out of it. This is literally a dying man’s wish that followed him into death. 

It takes a few minutes -- a few long minutes that have Derek contemplating whether or not he should leave -- before the door unlocks and opens. Derek knows that he must look like shit, he hasn’t slept well in at least 24 hours and still has his hospital bracelet on because he couldn’t figure out how to cut it off, but the man standing in the doorway gives him a run for his money. 

He’s pretty, with big eyes, long lashes, and perfect skin and cheekbones, but his eyes look sunken and his mouth is curved into a long frown. He has crow’s feet around his eyes, smile wrinkles, and greying hair. He looks sad. Derek clears his throat. “Uh. Hi. My name is Derek. I, uh…” He rubs his neck self-consciously. “I live on 591 Eastwood Drive?” He says, realizing that he came here with no plan.

The man pales and manages to look more like a ghost than anyone in Derek’s house. “What...why are you here?” He asks, voice hoarse.

“I...I felt like I needed to be here,” Derek shrugs, rubbing his neck again and then sighing in frustration. He isn’t looking forward to going back to the house without being able to tell Jackson anything. 

The man still looks haunted, but he opens his door further. “Come in,” he says. Derek hesitates with surprise, but then steps through the threshold, feeling relieved. Jackson had told him about Danny, his best friend from middle school and beyond, who had been the one to find his body. 

_“Jackson?” Danny asked. When he didn’t get a response, he ran to his friend, who was sprawled on the living room floor, chest to the ceiling. He fell to his knees, shaking his friend. “Jackson, wake up. Jackson!”_

_His blue eyes, so unseeing. His skin, pale and cool. Needle marks tracing his arms, a spent syringe still clutched in his fist._

_Danny held his childhood friend’s body and sobbed, dialing 911 with shaky fingers as Jackson watched the scene unfold from a few feet away._

Jackson’s expression had been blank as he explained the moment, and Derek can see it reflected in Danny’s eyes even today, 24 years later. “Can I get you anything to drink?” He asks, but before Derek can decline, the screaming of a baby interrupts. “Give me one moment.” Danny says, disappearing up the stairs. He comes back a few minutes later, a swaddled infant in his arms. 

Danny catches Derek watching and smiles tiredly. “I know, I know,” Danny says. “Forty-seven with an infant. My husband is a bit younger than me, but we’ll both be old men when he’s grown,” he looks down at the baby, nothing but adoration in his eyes. “We had been trying to adopt for a while, and just when we had given up hope, a woman who visited the homeless shelter I work for got pregnant and told me she was either going to get an abortion or give the baby away. Time passed, and an abortion wasn’t an option. When she asked me to be his father….” Danny clears his throat. “She wanted a better life for him. How could I say no?” 

It’s been a while since Derek’s seen a baby, but he remembers the etiquette. “What’s his name?”

“Jackson,” Danny gives him a watery smile. “We named him Jackson.”

Derek walks into his home, throwing his keys into the small dish on the dining table. He has Danny’s phone number in his pocket and plans to have dinner with him and his husband next week. He’s still not sure exactly how that happened, but it had something to do with baby Jackson being so infatuated by his beard that the infant stopped crying and Danny’s smile.

It’s like Jackson has been waiting for him to come home, and he materializes on the couch next to Derek seconds after Derek collapses into it. “How is he?” He asks, carefully averting his eyes. His fingers are drumming his thighs, his heels bouncing silently. 

“He has a son. And a husband,” Derek says. 

Jackson snaps his head to Derek, then looks away again. His eyes look full of unshed tears. Can ghosts cry? “Does he look happy?”

Derek considers. “He misses you.”

Jackson looks at Derek with intensity. _“Does he look happy?”_ He grits out.

Derek swallows and nods. “Yes, he looks happy.” 

The ghost visibly deflates, burying his face in his hands. An overwhelming feeling of melancholy and relief fills Derek, and he knows that the emotions are not his own. He welcomes them anyway.

Derek isn’t sure if he expected Jackson to just disappear now that his business was taken care of or not, but if he did, he was dead wrong. If anything, he actually sees Jackson more. On nights when he can’t sleep because the pain in his arm is sending what feels like electric bolts through the rest of his body, he can feel Jackson sitting there, on the edge of his bed, lending his comfort. He catches glimpses of Jackson in the living room, sitting on the reclining chair, staring at an empty spot of the living room. Derek doesn’t ask what he’s looking at, just sits next to him until Jackson disappears.

[Allison's Song: Buy the Stars](https://youtu.be/Vf8e3OozHlI)

Derek is smoking a cigarette on his back porch a few weeks later when he’s approached by the woman who haunts his backyard. Derek watches her approach carefully, and she joins him leaning against the railing. Derek marvels, wondering how she keeps from falling straight through. “I’ve heard a lot about you,” she says. She nods her head towards his sling. “I also heard that you were unfortunate enough to get in the path of Jackson’s rage.” Derek raises a single eyebrow at her and takes another drag. Her lips quirk upwards. “They didn’t tell me your name, though. Would you share it with me?” 

Derek puts out the cigarette on the concrete porch and pulls out another one, lighting it and then shoving the lighter back into his jacket pocket. It might be July, but it’s always a good time for a light jacket. “I’ve been living here for months, and none of you know my name?” He can feel an almost teasing tone in his own voice, something he hasn’t heard in a while. “Haven’t you read my mail or something?”

The girl looks back towards the trees. “I don’t go in the house,” she says. He knows there's probably a deeper meaning there, but he doesn't comment.

“Derek,” he answers instead, sucking down more nicotine.

"What brings you to sunny Beacon Hills, Derek?" She asks.

"What's your name?" He asks.

Based on the way her lips purse, she knows that he's diverting the conversation, but she doesn't seem to mind too much. "Allison," she says simply. 

Derek sighs and moves from leaning against the railing on his non-slung elbow to leaning on his forearm. "1982," he says. 

She looks pleasantly surprised. "You did your research." 

He lets out an involuntary laugh of surprise. It sounds bitter to his ears. "What is it with you people and your research?" 

She shrugs. "We like it when people move in here that we can talk to. So many people who move in here lack...perspective." 

"You mean they're not as lonely as me," Derek chuckles. Allison reminds him of Laura, and it makes him feel warm inside. It makes him want to snub his cigarette out. Laura hated it when he smoked. 

"Lonely beings share a connection with other lonely beings, Derek," Allison says. "Why do you think we all like you so much?" 

"How did you die?" Derek asks abruptly. 

He sees in his peripheral that she turns to him, but he can't look at her. "I think my dad put it in my obituary," she says. 

Derek takes a strong drag. "I just...it's different, hearing it straight from the source." 

"I was shot," she blurts abruptly. There’s a moment of silence, and Derek turns to look at her. She doesn't look like Jackson did, all lost in the memory and far away, as if watching her death replay on a screen. Instead she looks like she's in the middle of the moment again, her eyes scanning the yard as if she's anticipating the fatal shot. 

"It was an accident. My cousin was using arrows that were too light for his crossbow, and it misfired." She smiles bitterly. "I remember gasping for air, the arrow had punctured my lung. And my dad, he was holding me. And everything was happening underwater. Then I woke up here, in the same place I died, only my family wasn't living here anymore and my new home was these woods." 

“I’m sorry,” Derek says, because he’s not sure what to say to someone who died. There really isn’t any protocol for this. 

Allison shrugs. “It could be worse. We’re kind of like a family here. A dead, fucked up family.” She glances behind them at the house. “Scott visits me the most back here, since the front yard is kind of his domain, but I get to see the rest of them once in a while.”

“Why don’t you go into the house?” Derek can’t stop himself from asking. 

She purses her lips. “The thought of going in there….” She breaks off, shaking her head and looking back out at the trees. “No, I feel much safer here in the backyard.” 

The irony isn’t lost on him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNINGS: brief overdose scene (not graphic), grief
> 
> Songs:  
> [Videotape](https://youtu.be/-0ZECWpnQNQ) by Radiohead. Jackson's apology to Danny. “Because I can’t do it face to face, I’m telling you now, before it’s too late.”
> 
> [Buy the Stars](https://youtu.be/Vf8e3OozHlI) by Marina. Allison's goodbye. "We come alone and alone we die, and no matter how hard you try I'll always belong in the sky."


	4. Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How is this already chapter four? Also, has anyone realized how much Stiles talks like he's from the '70s? I tried to make him more '70s but Stiles from the show is already '70s enough haha.
> 
> Well, I wrote this instead of studying for my finals, so hopefully you all enjoy while I tank my GPA lol
> 
> But seriously, enjoy!!

[Lydia](https://youtu.be/tYIo1pXakkI)

“You haven’t been searching us out,” Derek hears as he’s sweeping the kitchen, and at this point he’s far beyond jumping out of surprise. He turns around to see a young woman with long strawberry blonde hair standing in his kitchen, arms crossed. She has on heels, high-waisted Levis, and a large tan blazer over a white blouse. Derek recognizes the outfit, because he’s seen pictures of his mom back in the ‘80s, wearing the same thing as the woman standing in front of him. Derek just looks at her, figuring she’ll get to the point eventually.

“You’re different than the others we’ve had here.” She’s looking at him like an entomologist looks at a bug, and he’s not sure he likes it. Actually, he’s positive. He just stares back at her, and as he does he realizes that deep, bloody gashes have begun appearing on her face, and a wound right over her heart appears, thick red blood staining her silky blouse. She cocks her head to the side. “I can see why Stiles likes you.”

“I haven’t even said anything,” Derek grumbles, beginning sweeping again. It’s unnerving to watch blood drip from her face and he needs a distraction. When did his life become literally insane?

“You don’t need to,” she says. “You’re fascinating in yourself. Usually we get families, or college roommates. But you...a single man, buying a three-bedroom house? Why?” Derek shrugs. “And why haven’t you put anything in the two bedrooms, just the master?”

Derek glares up at her from under his eyebrows. He sweeps in silence for a few seconds. “They felt occupied,” he mumbles. Her gaze intensifies, and Derek starts to feel hot beneath it. “Why do you all mention Stiles so much?” He blurts.

“What?” She asks sharply, taking him aback.

“I just...I mean that everyone keeps mentioning Stiles in regards to me. Why is it so important that he likes me?”

The woman -- Lydia, Derek assumes -- looks a little surprised. “I do believe there is something you might find helpful.” She finally uncrosses her arms, and the blood seeps further down her shirt. “We’re all here, stuck on the property that took our lives. But Stiles, he’s here by choice. Isaac was the first of us to die, and when Stiles died, he chose to stay here with Isaac, so he wouldn’t be alone.” She looks at Derek seriously. “Even if I wasn’t stuck here, I would choose to stay, at least until my loved ones die,” she says. “I don’t know if that’s how it works, but I can promise you that everyone else here would do the same. Because we love Stiles. We love what he did for little boy.”

“Can Isaac not leave?” Derek asks. 

Lydia shrugs. “Isaac seems to be the only reason the land can hold ghosts. His pain and suffering that he experienced during life has left an imprint here that draws death and destruction. Isaac is the foundation of this land. We doubt he can ever leave.”

Derek sucks in a breath. “That’s so sad,” he says quietly, imagining Isaac’s haunted face and gaunt cheeks.

“He doesn’t seem to think so. He says he doesn’t have anyone waiting for him in Heaven.”

“He says he doesn’t know if he believes in Heaven,” Derek shoots back bitterly. 

Lydia steps closer to him. “Do you?”

Derek wants to laugh at the absurdity of it all. “Not anymore,” he says, and Lydia disappears.

[Stiles and Memories](https://youtu.be/v8TlgTYWOn8)

Derek’s arm is completely healed by the time the man in the striped yellow pants -- Stiles -- approaches him in his bedroom. 

“We have something we’d like to show you,” he says gently, tilting his head towards the doorway, and Derek silently follows, long since realizing that it isn’t worth the argument.

Derek trails Stiles all the way down the hall until they stop in one of the 2 bedrooms in the middle, closest to the staircase. There's one tall window in the middle of the wall and a high ceiling, and the uniform wooden floors from the rest of the house that creak beneath his feet. Stiles walks ahead into the room and kneels on the floor, looking back up at Derek and jerking his head towards the floor. Derek joins him, kneeling as Stiles's mirror image. 

"Like, press your fingers here," Stiles guides him, gliding his own fingers along the floor and guiding Derek's as he goes along. Derek presses with a sharp force, and the board snaps open with a harsh creak. He startles backwards, then presses forward again, warily eyeing the darkness under the board. When he looks up at Stiles cautiously, he sees that Jackson, Scott, and a man (or boy?) that Derek doesn’t recognize are all standing around the room, watching him. Stiles smiles encouragingly and nods his head towards the open board. 

Derek leans forward and peers inside, a little afraid of what he might find. He’s surprised to see a whole trove full of tiny treasures. He reaches in and pulls out a small gaming console, recognizing it as something his older cousin had once owned. 

“Gameboy Color,” Scott offers, awarding one of his crooked smiles. “I begged my parents for one for years. Even when I left for college, I couldn’t bear to part with it for good.”

Derek turns it in his hands, examining it. On the back, it has a piece of tape stretched over it and, etched in black marker, is Scott’s name. He carefully sets it aside. He’s realizing that this moment is important, and he feels the weight of each movement. He lightens his breathing and takes another thing from the floorboard. It’s shaped like a box, and has what feels like at least five layers of duct tape wrapped around it as a sealant. 

“Those are my drugs,” Jackson blurts. “I...I could never bring myself to get rid of them. Could you?” He asks, and Derek carefully places the wrapped drugs beside Scott’s gameboy. 

“Of course,” he says softly. 

“There’s more in there,” Jackson mumbles, embarrassed. Derek reaches in and takes out the rest of the duct tape-wrapped bundles, trying not to make it a big deal. When he grabs the next thing, he holds it up to examine it, and it catches the light just so. It’s a ring hanging from a simple chain, and the small ruby in it twinkles merrily, as if it’s happy to see the sun.

“I bought it for my girlfriend,” the boy that Derek doesn’t recognize says. He’s read about everyone in the house so much that he knows it must be Boyd. And the ghost must be referring to Erica, his highschool sweetheart that he never got to grow old with. Derek stares at the ring in a complete loss. Every single moment -- every laugh, every fight, every joy and every scream -- is held in the promise of this one ring. Everything that wasn’t is in his hand. He sets it down, swallowing hard. There is still one more spirit in the room, and he owes it to him to finish pulling everything out. 

He sticks his hand back in one last time and brings out a small bundle, held together with cloth and a drawstring. He sets the bundle on the floor and pulls the drawstring. The cloth falls, pooling around its contents. There’s dried lavender, which still lets off a faint scent, and a small perfume bottle that still has the smallest sliver of liquid in it catches his eye first. He picks it up, sniffing at it and surprised by the lovely scent, like fresh berries. He sets it to the side and picks up a Sheriff’s badge that reads “Stilinski” on it. He glances up at Stiles, who is just gazing at the package with a faraway look in his eyes. Derek continues, pulling out a crumpled letter, a folded photograph, and a single foreign coin. Stiles is still silent, so he looks back up at the spirit.

Derek is sure that if ghosts could cry, Stiles would be wiping tears from his eyes. As it is, his eyes never leave the package’s contents. “Those are my parents’ belongings. The last things I had of them, you know.” Stiles closes his eyes, brow creased in pain. “It’s all he would let me keep of them, and even then, I had to hide them so he wouldn’t change his mind.” Stiles’s voice is small yet angry. Derek looks around and realizes that all the other ghosts have disappeared.

“Who is he?” Derek asks. There wasn't much about Stiles, just a simple obituary and a news article labeled, "Homosexual Murdered in Domestic Dispute." It hadn't been a kind article.

Stiles bites his lip and looks out the window. “He wouldn’t let me out of the house. Didn’t want anyone to get the wrong idea. I met him after both of my parents had died, and I was so young and lost. He offered his hand. Offered his life. Offered me everything. And I was stupid. I believed him when he said he loved me.” Stiles seems to fold in on himself. “The first time he hit me, he apologized so much I just knew it had to be an accident. The second time, too. And the third. And then I realized that it was my penance. For being with someone so incredible, for being homosexual, I had to pay a price. It seemed small, for the security and love and sex I received in return.

“He kept getting angrier. He was so, so angry. I remember the look in his eyes that day. He was upset that I didn’t kiss him back as passionately as he wanted me to. He blamed me, accused me of sleeping around. ‘I can’t,’ I had said. ‘How am I supposed to meet someone else? You never let me out of this goddamn house,’ is what I said to him. Can you believe that?” Stiles laughs bitterly. “My dad always said that my mouth would get me killed. All I remember was the blood, and the pain. At one point I stopped feeling the floor. And I lost my sight after the third bludgeon or so. I was....I was so weak. So scared. And then I woke up. He was crying over my body. Then he cleaned up the blood from the kitchen floor. Our neighbors caught him in the act. The look on his face...I think he was more horrified that everyone would find out that he was a fag rather than a murderer.”

"What happened to him?" Derek asks quietly, in awe of the horror of the ghost's death. 

Stiles shrugs, his grin returning, if not a little bitterly. "I can't leave this house, even now that he's long gone. I don't know what became of him. No newspaper articles, huh?" 

Derek clears his throat. "Ah, well, they're all a little vague? I…." 

Stiles bursts out laughing, stopping Derek's tirade. "Yeah, probably didn't want to give too much press to the fags.” He chuckles. “The sixties and seventies were not kind.” He looks at Derek. “Did you know that when I died, homosexuality was still on the American Psychiactric Association’s list of psychiactric disorders? Scott’s told me since that it’s more normalized. But when I died, it was abhorrent to sleep with another man.” 

They’re silent for a moment. “Pretty much the only people who are alive today that hate gay people are people who would be your age.” 

“Like, if I hadn’t died?” Stiles asks, his eyes alight.

Derek nods, hiding a smile. “Yup. You’d be completely homophobic.” 

Stiles outright grins. “Dude, good thing I died, then.” 

Derek shakes his head, holding in a chuckle. “Don’t call me dude.” 

“What am I supposed to do with all of these things?” Derek asks Stiles. Derek is eating dinner at his kitchen table and staring at the treasures that came from beneath the floorboard. For some reason, Stiles decided to stick around instead of disappearing to wherever the ghosts go to when Derek can’t see them. 

Stiles shrugs. “Everyone has their own wishes, if you’re willing to carry them out. Jackson wants the drugs destroyed, Boyd wants the ring sent to his ex girlfriend, Scott doesn’t want his Gameboy to rot under the floors of this place. I just didn’t want my parent’s memories forgotten.” 

Derek looks down at the duct-taped packages. “How does one destroy drugs?” 

Stiles shrugs again. “We did all the drugs we got.” 

Derek glares. “Not helpful.” 

Which is what leads to him standing in the backyard, Allison and Scott watching him amusedly, as he rips the duct tape from the packages and tries to light the contents on fire.

“Did it ever occur to you,” Scott says carefully, “that burning drugs is how you actually do them?”

Derek glares at the two ghosts, stomping on the smoldering remains and trying his best to ignore them. He sets something else in one of Jackson’s bundles on fire with a small lighter and jumps back just in time to watch it burst into a fairly good-sized flame. Allison and Scott break into peals of laughter, and Derek’s pretty sure that his headache isn’t from the secondhand drug exposure.

“Hey Derek,” Allison starts, and Derek groans.

“What?”

“Aren’t Danny and his husband coming over in less than an hour for dinner?” She asks innocently. 

“Shit!” Derek runs into his house, wondering if an electric fan can disperse the smell of weed fast enough. Scott and Allison’s laughter follow him all the way up the stairs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNINGS: gore, domestic abuse, homophobic slurs
> 
> Lydia's Song: [Lonely People](https://youtu.be/tYIo1pXakkI). It just seems so fitting for her. Just let be what will be, you know?
> 
> Stiles's Song/Mems: [I Need Some Sleep](https://youtu.be/v8TlgTYWOn8). To me, Stiles is just looking for relief. He chose to be here, but he wants to finally be at rest, and wants his friends to be at rest too.


	5. Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took so long because I took a week off for Christmas and New Years (both of which my family celebrates with great passion, ha). 
> 
> I hope you enjoy!!

Derek repeatedly clenches and unclenches his fist, working his jaw wordlessly. He once again doesn’t know how he got roped into this. Damn his bleeding heart. If Laura were here, she’d chuckle and bump his shoulder with hers, then encourage him to ring the doorbell of the run-down apartment. So he does.

He counts _one, two, three, four_ before the door swings open. "Hello," the woman at the door says. She has long, curly blonde hair, big eyes, and a child attached to her hand. The child has beautiful curly brown hair and dark eyes. 

"Hello," Derek returns the greeting. "I know you don't know me, but my name is Derek Hale. I live at 591 Eastwood Drive.” It worked with Danny, and he hopes to get the same response now. The woman looks at him with what might be hatred in her eyes and she slams the door. Derek blinks at the closed door, then rings the doorbell again. 

[Erica's Song from Boyd](https://youtu.be/dzNvk80XY9s) (also the song from which the title comes)

She wrenches it open, murder in her eyes. “Leave my doorway, now.” She says severely. 

She’s about to close the door again. “Wait!” Derek says. “I think I have something that belongs to you.” She gives pause, her jaw clenched. 

Her eyes flick to Derek, then to his closed fist. “What is it?” She asks. He opens his palm and dangles the ring on its chain from his hand. He watches her eyes widen and face slacken as she stares at it, then her eyes become hard and she slams the door again. Derek barely has time to blink at the closed door again before it’s being opened, this time fully, and she steps to the side. “Well are you going to come in?” She snaps, and he jolts into motion, entering the apartment.

It’s nice, especially considering how decrepit the outside of the apartment complex is. The apartment is stylishly decorated and there are toys strewn across the floor, from legos to cars to stuffed animals to dolls. The kid is glued to who he assumes is Erica’s leg, staring up at Derek shyly. He tries to smile, but he’s never been very good with kids. He's sure all he's managed to do is make the kid more uncomfortable. 

If Erica is anything, she’s direct. “Where did you get that?” She asks, not even looking at him. 

“It was under the floorboards in the first bedroom on the second floor,” Derek says, just like Boyd instructed him to. 

She stops pacing, seemingly in the beginning stages of calming down. Boyd described this, as well. “How did you know it’s for me?” She asks quietly. 

“There was a note,” Derek says, regurgitating Boyd’s words. “It said that it belonged to an Erica Reyes. I figured you may want it back.” Derek holds it out to her. 

Her eyes are watery as she steps closer to him and takes it gently, holding the ring in her hand and staring down at it in a reverie. “Momma, what is it?” The child asks, hopping up to try and see it. 

“It’s from your daddy,” she says gently, lowering her cupped hand to show the kid. 

“Vernon Boyd II?” The tiny voice asks, and she nods. 

She clears her throat and her eyes flick back to Derek. “Our engagement ring,” she says quickly. “I’m not sure how much you know about the house, but he….” 

“I know,” Derek says gently. When she looks at him curiously, he shrugs. “People talk.”

She laughs bitterly. “They do, don’t they?” She pulls a pack of cigarettes from her coat pocket. "Want one?" She asks, heading towards the sliding door in the living room. Derek nods, following her. "Vernon honey, go play," she places her hand on the boy's head, and he runs off while they enter the balcony. 

Erica lights Derek's and then hers, sticking the lighter on a ledge too high for Vernon to reach. 

"How long have you lived in the house?" She asks. 

"I moved in around March. So eight or so months."

"You there alone?"

Derek stares at his shoes. "I'm not great with people." She laughs at that.

"Well, you did track down a total stranger and give them a ring just because a note said to."

Derek shrugs. "How old is he?" Derek asks, watching Erica's child through the glass. 

Erica spares him a glance, then goes back to watching Vernon. "Four. He turns five in April." She glances back at Derek. "I can see you trying to do the mental math. Yes, he's Boyd's boy, hence the name." She sighs deeply. "I didn't even know I was pregnant until after the funeral. Happy Boyd's death day to me, huh?" She shakes her head and takes a long drag. 

"It seems like he loved you," Derek offers.

"Loved me enough to leave me." She shakes her head again and looks at the ring in her palm. "I love rubies. He told me that when he asked me to marry him, it would be a ruby encased in gold. I would have been fine with just his promise.

"My mother wanted me to get an abortion. But he was all I had left of Boyd. She decided she didn't have to support me if I was making, and I quote, 'bad decisions based on a middle school crush.' I was a junior, and I finished my education. But now Vernon and I are alone." 

"I'm the last person to talk," Derek says, "but I can assure you that you're not alone." Erica looks down, letting her hair form a curtain around her face. They stand in silence for a moment before she goes back to supervising Vernon. 

"I thought he could beat it," she says suddenly.

"Depression?" Derek asks.

"No, that damned house," she extinguishes her butt on her exposed thigh, and Derek sees that she has an innumerable amount of circular burn marks littering her thighs. He looks away.

"What do you mean?"

She looks at him sharply. "Can't you feel it? There's something wrong with that house." She rolls her cigarette butt between her fingers. "So many people have died there. It just takes, and takes, and takes. And it decided to take him.”

[Jackson's Song](https://youtu.be/EaS_ZVJOVyY)

“Derek. Are you serious, man?” Brett laughs, raising his eyebrows at Derek from where he’s sitting on the couch. 

Derek sighs and throws his hands down in exasperation. “I told you I’ve only done this a few times, decades ago!” 

Danny’s laughing too, but it’s not mean. He holds Jackson on his lap, who’s currently preoccupied by a teething ring. “Just get into it! Let yourself go,” Danny says. 

“Now that’s something I know for a fact he hasn’t done in a while,” Brett leers, trailing his eyes down Derek’’s figure appreciatively. 

Danny smacks his husband’s chest as Derek turns a cherry red and regrets the slightly-too-tight henley he decided to wear for game night. 

“But seriously Derek, just look at your card and try again,” Danny waves his hand at him, and Derek breathes deeply through his nose, wondering how he got talked into this.

Danny flashes him a large, encouraging smile. He idly wonders if that’s the smile Danny would use to encourage Jackson to do stupid stunts back when they were teens. And ...Oh yeah. That’s why.

Derek glares down at the card and then back at the guests on his couch. He heaves a long sigh and puts the card down, making the signal for song by putting a microphone to his lips. 

“Song!” Danny yells out, and Derek nods in confirmation. 

When Danny brought up the idea for a game night, Derek surprised himself by immediately offering to host. He doesn’t know exactly why, but he has a feeling it has something to do with how empty the house feels without other people in it. And a game night seemed...kind of fun? Or distracting, anyways. Derek used to play games with his family all the time. He remembers those moments hazily, but knows that they were shrouded in laughter and fun and love.

When it was just him and Laura, they tried to play some of the games again, but it wasn’t the same. He remembers very clearly when she packed up the games and put them in a box in the garage. They donated them all in hopes that they would bring a new family some kind of joy. 

And then she died a few months later.

But now...Danny and Brett are looking at him with joyous anticipation, and Derek can’t stand putting a look of disappointment on their faces. 

He places his hands out in front of him, palms up, and begins to wiggle his hips a little. He flips his hands palm-down, then pulls them back into his torso.

“Push It!” Brett says. 

“No honey, he’s pulling,” Danny stares intently at Derek, waiting for his next move. Derek repeats the aborted hand motions and then places his hands on his hips and rotates them. “Hips Don’t Lie!” Danny calls. 

Derek repeats his previous movements, trying to remember the rest of the dance. He can’t recall, so he keeps trying until the sand runs out of the mini hourglass. “What was it?” Danny asks.

“Macarena,” Derek mumbles, and both Danny and Brett break out into loud protests. 

“Macarena!?” Brett asks. “That wasn’t the macarena!” 

Derek shrugs. “I couldn't remember the whole thing.”

“Couldn’t remember the….” Brett shakes his head, smiling. “Danny, where’d you find this guy again?”

“He found me, if I recall correctly,” Danny says, smiling back at the both of them. He hands baby Jackson to Derek and then slaps his thighs as he stands. “My turn!” He picks up a card and smiles widely at it, then reels his fist as if reeling an old tape.

“Movie!” Brett says, and Danny nods, moving onto his next move. Derek starts bouncing his leg to make Jackson coo.   
Danny starts to mime something that looks an awful lot like he’s jacking a huge dick off. “Magic Mike?” Brett asks, and Danny looks exasperated. He changes the angle of his motion, but it still looks like he’s jacking someone off. “Zack and Miri Make a Porno?” 

Danny gives up on that motion, and starts to fling his hand at the ground. It almost looks like he’s miming throwing a frisbee, or feeding birds. “Hard Ticket to Hawaii?” Brett asks. “Frisbee?” “Spun?” 

Derek looks at Brett. “Those are all horrible movies.” Brett just shrugs. 

Danny starts doing what Derek thinks is the weirdest dance ever, or someone in mild pain. He decides to take a shot at guessing. “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York?” He asks. 

Danny pauses, then bursts into peals of laughter. “What?” Derek asks, and even Brett has started giggling a little. “What did I say?”

Danny shakes his head, still choking on giggles. “It was just ....so specific. Honestly the last thing I ever thought would come out of your mouth.” His eyes sweep to where the timer is. “Well neither of you guessed it, but it was Mary Poppins.” 

“Are you serious!?” Brett asks. 

“I was opening the umbrella!!” Danny defends, making the jacking off motion again.

“Ooooooh,” Brett and Derek say.

“Not gonna lie, looked like you were getting a huge dick off,” Brett admits. 

“Are you guys serious?” Danny asks, and they both nod. Danny just bursts out laughing again, and Derek thinks he sees the other man wiping away a tear of laughter.

Derek’s about to hand Jackson back when he sees a flash of Stiles’s pants in the arched doorway to the hall. “I gotta use the bathroom, be right back,” he hands Jackson back to Danny and follows the remnant of Stiles, hoping to speak with him briefly.

He sees him going into the kitchen and he joins the ghost, who looks surprised to see him.

“What are you doing following me around for?” Stiles grins, nodding his head to the happy family in his living room. “You have some real, live people in the house. That’s a first.” Derek would be offended if it wasn’t true.

“Does Jackson want to hang out in the same room as us?” Derek asks quietly. He thought he had seen Jackson lurking earlier on in the evening. 

“Jackson?” Stiles looks both confused and concerned. “Jackson’s gone.”

“Gone? Gone where? What happened?” Derek asks, looking around as if Jackson will suddenly appear to him and Stiles.

Stiles shrugs. “He saw that Danny was happy. I guess that that’s all he wanted. He told Scott that he saw the most beautiful thing anyone could ever see, and that’s the last we saw of him.”

Derek stares at the ghost, mouth slightly agape. “And when did this happen?” 

Stiles chews on the inside of his cheek. “You know ghosts, time works differently for us. Could’ve been thirty seconds ago, could have been hours ago.”

“Where did he go?”

“Wouldn’t we all like to know,” Stiles says wistfully.

Derek looks around again. It feels so sudden. So anticlimactic. “So he’s gone? Just like that?” Do they all really leave this world so uneventfully? Does anyone even care?

Stiles gives him a smile that he can’t interpret, like he knows exactly what Derek is thinking. “Just like that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> POSSIBLE TRIGGERS: secondhand embarrassment, suicide
> 
> [Saturn](https://youtu.be/dzNvk80XY9s), Sleeping at Last: What I imagine Erica thinks about every time she thinks of Boyd. High school sweethearts who never got the chance.
> 
> [Perfect Day](https://youtu.be/EaS_ZVJOVyY), Lou Reed: What I imagine Jackson hears as he watches the people he loves move on enough that he feels like he can finally do it himself.


	6. Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome back! Sorry this took so long to update, school is hard!! 
> 
> I wanted to post this in time for Scott's 10th death anniversary, but I'm about 30 minutes too late (which means it's officially my birthday! hbd to me, I guess! Here's my present to all of you.
> 
> I didn't feel like either of the songs for the chapter fit directly in it, but I like them anyway for this chapter and they're listed at the end! 
> 
> Thank you for reading!

Derek cowers in the closet, trying to be as still as he can under some coats. There’s a shoe worming its way into a place it shouldn’t be, but he doesn’t dare move to adjust it. He strains to listen for anything at all, trying not to feel too disappointed or anxious when he can’t hear anything. Deep breath in, shallow breath out. Deep breath in, shallow breath--

“Found you!” Isaac exclaims as he flings the closet door open. His voice is high and breathy. and if he could get out of breath, Derek guesses that he would be. The excited smile on Isaac’s face makes the shoe shoved up his ass worth it.

"You did," Derek congratulates as he stands up with difficulty, shutting the closet door. "I need a break, that okay Isaac?" Isaac nods and runs off, green blanket trailing behind him. Derek rubs his face tiredly. 

It's September, and Derek had promised to make it the best birthday month ever for Isaac. Everyone in the house is chipping in, playing with Isaac a little longer and harder than usual, letting him ramble a little more, and planning his party. It had been Stiles's idea to throw him a party. At first Derek was hesitant, mostly because how do you throw a birthday party for a 7-year-old ghost, but Stiles had convinced him that you don't need cake or other children to make his birthday exciting.

That's why Derek has a ton of balloons in his car, including two big ones that read "60" when put together and lots of ones with pictures of puppies. He also has a few battery-powered toys that he's sure Isaac will enjoy trying to turn on. Stiles had tested each one to make sure he could do it before Derek had thrown away the receipts. 

Derek’s smuggling all of the things for Isaac’s party inside as Isaac plays with Allison in the backyard. “This is the most fun I’ve had in decades,” Stiles says from his perch on the oven as he watches Derek blow up puppy balloons. They don’t have a cake or anything, since only Derek can eat it, but they have all of the presents hidden around the house so that Isaac can have a good time trying to find them. 

Derek feels like a party is just what they all need; ever since Jackson’s departure, a weird fog had settled over the house. It was both exciting and terrifying for the ghosts to know that they might be able to leave, and each ghost had approached Derek to ask if he could help them try and descend to the Great Beyond, too. Derek figures he doesn’t have much else to do. It’s odd yet refreshing to feel compassion and pity for someone other than himself. This party seems to be a great way to bring everyone out of their endless scheming for ways to be free from their current situation. 

The party passes for Derek in a complete blur. There’s Isaac’s hauntingly high pitched laughing; Boyd’s gentle hands as he combed through Isaac’s pretty little curls; Scott’s spaz-like dancing; Allison’s dimples; Lydia’s eyebrows as a balloon floated too close to her face; Stiles’s wide smile. Derek can’t decide if that day is happy or sad. He wonders what someone looking in from the outside would see: a man with a too-wild beard, devastation in his eyes but a smile on his face, dancing with the ghosts in his house.

It’s a few days after all the celebration when Derek is sitting at the kitchen table, brainstorming ways for Boyd to meet his son. He and Erica had had a great moment during their first meeting, but he’s not sure if she ever wants to see him again. Trying to get her to come over -- and bring her son -- seems a little too unreachable at the moment. He groans and leans back in his chair, rubbing his face. When he opens his eyes again, Stiles is standing next to him with a playful grin on his face.

“No luck?” He asks. Derek just glares. “C’mon, you should take a break. You just spent a whole month planning the best birthday ever for Isaac. These guys have all waited a long time. They can wait a little longer to get out of this house.”

“But all I have to do is come up with a plan,” Derek says. 

“At the sake of your sanity? I’m sure something will come to you,” Stiles says back. 

“Maybe,” Derek mumbles.

Stiles’s head snaps up as he looks towards the living room. “Or maybe _someone,”_ Stiles murmurs, eyes wide.

“What do you mean?” Derek asks, and his doorbell rings. He looks back at Stiles and they share a long look. Unlike usual, Stiles doesn’t disappear, and instead follows Derek to the front door. 

“Well, are you going to open it?” Stiles asks after they get there and Derek spends a solid ten seconds with his hand on the doorknob. 

“Just give me a moment,” Derek snaps. “Who do you think it could be?” 

Stiles rolls his eyes. “We’ll never know if you don’t open the door. Be a good host, Derek.” 

Derek takes a breath and pulls the door open. On his doorstep is a young man with warm blue eyes. He kind of reminds him of Jackson, except the boy standing in front of him is softer. They both stand and stare at each other for what feels like an eternity. “Hello,” Derek finally says.

“Hello! Yes. sorry,” the boy responds, cheeks reddening. 

“What can I do for you?” Derek carefully maneuvers the conversation, a little more wary now.

“I’m sorry. I…” The kid looks nervous and a little puzzled, as if he’s not sure what he’s doing standing on Derek’s porch. “My name is Liam McCall. I used to live here?” He bites his lip. “Mr. Mahealani told me someone moved in. When he stopped in.” 

Derek stares at the kid. “I’m sorry, I’m not following.”

“Oh! Yeah. Sorry. I volunteer at the local clinic. Mr. Mahealani stopped by -- nothing serious! -- and mentioned that someone new moved into this house.” He shuffles his feet on the porch. “We both have history with this place.” 

Derek opens the door further. “Would you like to come in and sit?” 

Liam looks surprised at the offer, but he nods immediately. Derek catches a glimpse of Scott’s figure as Liam brushes past him into the house, and he’s slow to close the door. Hopefully Scott is listening. Derek and Stiles lead the kid into the kitchen, where Derek gestures to the kitchen table. “Want anything to drink?” He asks as Liam sits.

“Water, please.” Derek fills two glasses with water and brings them back to the table. He places one in front of Liam and watches the boy gulp it. Stiles has found his normal perch on the kitchen counter, and he softly swings his legs back and forth. 

“So you lived here with your family?” Derek urges gently, trying to prompt Liam for his reason for visiting. 

Liam nods. “Yeah, we all lived here. My room was the one in the corner upstairs. God, that was ten years ago.” He rubs his face. “I try not to think about this place. Hard to think that much time has gone by. It still looks like it did.” His hands are in gentle fists on top of the table as he takes in the kitchen. “So many memories here.”

“Good ones?” Derek prompts. 

“Some,” Liam says. “My brother did his best to let me be a kid. Our dad, you know. He was...not the most loving man. He once threw my brother down the stairs. I was too young to remember it, but I heard stories. I saw the pictures of him with his cast on. I think that must be where I got my temper from, you know?”

He taps his fingers on the tabletop. “But my brother gave me a happy childhood for as long as he could. And believe me, I had it good.”

They sit in silence for a while, and the grief is palpable. Derek thinks he’s getting good at sitting in silence, but even better at breaking it. “You don’t happen to know Scott McCall, do you?” 

Liam’s breath audibly hitches. “As a matter of fact, I did. Why do you ask?” 

Derek stands carefully, grabbing the small cardboard box of mementos from where it sits on the counter next to Stiles. He reaches into it and produces the handheld gaming device. “I found this the other day. I haven’t been able to start the search for who it belonged to. I’m glad it can be reunited with its rightful owner,” he hands the Gameboy Color to Liam, who looks close to tears. He carefully turns it around in his hands and traces Scott’s name on the back gently. 

Liam swallows thickly. “Thank you. This belonged to my brother, Scott. He died in 2010. Here. I….” He shakes his head. “I don’t know what I was expecting when I came here.” He laughs wetly. “It definitely wasn’t this.” He hasn’t looked up from the Gameboy yet. “Scott loved this Gameboy. He would let me play it whenever he was home from college. I was twelve, and I thought he was the coolest person ever. He was the coolest person ever. He said that when I was a teenager he would pass it on to me, because then I would appreciate it for everything it was.” A tear lands on Liam’s cheek, and he wipes it away and laughs again. “He died a few weeks before I turned thirteen.” 

“Oh god,” he says, looking horrified. “I’m sorry for just unloading that on you.”

Derek shakes his head, reaching out to Liam with his hand and then pulling back again. “Don’t apologize, Liam. I understand how you feel. I also lost my family at a young age.”

Liam looks a little less mortified, chewing on the inside of his lip. “I just remember what everyone said. ‘How tragic. He had his whole life in front of him. He was bright. Almost done with school.’ I hated it when they said that.”

“They forget that the dead leave behind so many people, and that we carry our suffering for much longer,” Derek adds quietly, bearing some of Liam’s grief. 

“I was so angry for so long. I wanted to know why. I wanted to kill the people that killed Scott,” Liam’s voice is hot and hard. “But anger didn’t fix anything. It didn’t catch the person who shot that gun. It didn’t stop my mom’s tears. And it didn’t bring Scott back.”

“What did you do with what Scott gave you?” Derek asks.

“What?” Liam looks startled.

“Scott gave you lessons of love, and family. What did you do with those lessons?” Derek asks again. He thinks of himself, of the lessons Laura taught him of duty to himself. Of his mother, and her lessons of family. Of his father and his lessons of responsibility. Of everyone who had died and their own lessons. 

“I went to school,” Liam says quietly. “I’m still going to school. I...I want to be a cardiac nurse. I want to help people. Scott’s heart was always so big, and I want to give the world even just a little of the compassion that left it when he did.” Tears start pooling in Liam’s eyes, and Derek watches the boy visibly fight them off. “I just want him to be proud.”

Derek stands and walks around to Liam’s side of the table, where he opens up his arms in offering. Liam stands and falls into them, hugging Derek tightly. Derek hugs him back. “Scott is so proud of you. I can feel his love and pride shine through you.” 

Liam shakes in his arms. From over Liam’s shoulder, he sees Stiles still sitting on the counter, this time joined by Scott, unshed tears caught forever in their eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Seasons in the Sun](https://youtu.be/-tPcc1ftj8E), Scott's little song that I loved for him.
> 
> [A conversation between Scott and Liam (bonus song)](https://youtu.be/enlrC2jRg_w)


	7. Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this entire chapter goes out to my roommate. I wrote myself into a hole and asked her, "Who's in the car?" with no context, and she immediately came up with the person who is now in the story. Did it throw a wrench in all of my plans? Yes. Am I happy for it? also yes.
> 
> I hope you enjoy, thanks for reading!

The cemetery is teeming with people, some putting flowers on graves, others wandering to the resting place of a loved one. Derek watches a couple make a rubbing of one gravestone, watches another pray above a fresh site. On the other side of the cemetery, a funeral is in process. Derek makes his way to the back of the cemetery, where the graves are cracking and emaciated, completely forgotten or abandoned. This is where the caretaker told him the grave he’s looking for will be. 

Derek counts the graves, stopping at the seventh. He looks down at the tiny grave he stopped at. It’s made of grey marble, cracked and mossy. On it, 7 decaying words are etched into the top.

**_UNKNOWN AT DEATH  
KNOWN ONLY TO GOD._ **

The grass around the grave is lush and green, undisturbed. A small series of numbers is carved in the bottom left corner. 1970. Four years after Isaac was murdered, his brother Camden Lahey overdosed, alone and unknown, in a stranger’s motel room four hours from Beacon Hills. No one claimed his body, and he didn’t have any kind of identification on him. The only reason Derek knows that this one is his is because Isaac was somehow able to provide eerily accurate instructions on how to find his brother’s grave. Derek figures it has something to do with where the ghosts go whenever he can’t see them, and decides that he doesn’t want to know the details.

Derek crouches down, setting the flowers he picked up on the way to the grave. He has a lot of experience talking to graves, but this time feels different.

“I’m sorry,” Derek says, because he isn’t quite sure what else to say. He can’t claim the grave, since there’s no reasonable explanation for him to know that Camden is the one who’s buried here. He also can’t bring Isaac here, or tell Camden that Isaac’s in a better place, or even know if Camden himself is in a better place. He can’t stop Camden’s fatal choice any more than he can whisk Isaac away from his abusive father. And so he’s just sorry. 

On his way back to his house, he stops at the local labor agency. He had heard from Scott that they’re always looking for people to do grunt jobs on random days, no commitment, immediate pay. Derek gives them his landline number and basic information before he heads home. 

When he gets there, he’s surprised to see a car in his driveway. He thinks back on his last conversation with Danny, but according to his mental schedule the other man and his family weren’t visiting again until next week. Derek doesn’t recognize the car, but parks beside it anyway. 

He gets out and walks up his driveway, Scott waving at him from the property line. Obviously, if Scott’s not too worried, he shouldn’t be either. He gets closer to the house and sees a figure on his porch, and as he gets closer his breathing increases in frequency. Standing on his front porch, his favorite coffee mug in hand, is another ghost -- this one with a heartbeat. 

“How goes it, big brother?” Cora asks him from her perch. She sounds so much like Laura it hurts. 

[Cora's Song](https://youtu.be/erqpdc9W8F8)

“Hi, Cora,” he manages. They stare at each other, studying what the years have done. Derek can tell they’ve taken a toll. “Where have you been?” He asks, because he isn’t sure where to go from here.

“South America,” she says, as if it’s nothing. Her face softens. “I couldn’t...after…” she trails off, and Derek just nods, scratching the back of his neck and looking away. He gets it. Everyone deals with their grief differently. 

“We missed you at the funerals,” he says instead. It feels accusing. He didn’t mean it that way.

She bites her lip. “Nice place,” she mentions. He looks at his house. He thinks he can see Boyd in the upstairs window. “Do you live here alone?”

He tears his eyes away, looking back at his little sister. “You could say that.”

She swings her legs. “Look. My boyfriend and I broke up. Can I crash here?” 

Derek inventories her. It’s been ten years since he last saw her. She’s nothing like the fifteen-year-old she was when the fire consumed their home and their family. She’s grown into her long legs, her hair is shorter. Her eyes and mouth are harder. He feels a quiet kind of devastation when he looks at her.

“Come in,” he says, leading her into the house even though she obviously helped herself to his things before he got there.

“So, do you have a job? Is that where you were?” She asks easily. 

He purses his lips as he leads her into the kitchen. “No. I was seeing a friend.”

“Oh. Have you lived here long? Do you have a lot of friends?”

He whirls on her. “What are you doing, Cora?” 

She looks startled. “What?”

He laughs miserably. “What are you doing? Why are you here?” 

“Because I’m your sister,” she says incredulously. 

He braces himself on the counter. “How did you even find me?”

“Your name comes up under this house,” she says, still stunned. “I came because I had nowhere else to go.”

He huffs another laugh, wishing he could peel the skin from his skull to make his brain shut up. “I- Nowhere else to go?” He chews his lips and begins pacing. “You think Laura and I had anywhere to go when our house burned down? When Peter was in a coma? When you ran away without a word!?”

She looks hurt. “As if I felt like I had a choice!”

“You did!” He screams. “You made us go through that alone! You _left!”_ A ball of regret rises in his throat and he forces it down. 

“Derek, where’s Laura?” Cora’s voice is carefully controlled. 

He laughs, louder this time, and stops in his tracks. He gets that he’s causing an unnecessarily dramatic scene, but it’s so _unfair_ that she decided to come back into his life now. “Dead! Like everyone else in this goddamn family!” He’s cried too many tears already, and this time is no exception. He hasn’t been able to cry over Laura’s death for years. “Do you know what it’s like to plan your sister’s funeral by yourself? I was the only one there! Where were you when Laura died, Cora? Galavanting across South America with your boyfriend? Where were you when she didn’t come home for a few days? Or when the police came knocking on our apartment door with her ID in hand? Or what about when I had to go down to the morgue and identify her body? Where were you then?” He throws at her. It’s unfair, and he knows it is, but everything about their lives has been unfair. He wants answers, no matter how selfish.

“What about when the hospital calls you to ask if they can please just pull the plug on your comatose uncle? Or when you try your hardest to find your little sister, because you think you’re the last one, and everyone tells you to give up because it’s not worth the trouble?” Derek can’t decipher the look on her face. “I buried you with them,” he says, stuck somewhere between wanting to hurt her and wanting to hold her, and she flinches. 

They stand there, everything he said thrown up on the floor between them. He can feel his words still attacking Cora as he catches his breath. 

She opens her mouth. Closes it. Looks to compose herself. When she looks up, there’s tears in her eyes. “I’m not the only one who ran,” she fires at him, voice breaking. 

“At least I was there when it mattered,” Derek spits back, immediately regretful. And Derek watches her turn and walk out, again.

[Derek's Interlude](https://youtu.be/JJVcop7au2M)

He doesn’t have the strength to follow her, and when he hears her car engine start up he slides to the kitchen floor, tears rising up in his throat. That was it. She was standing right there, in his grasp, and he opened up his hands and let whatever remnants of their fragile relationship that might have still existed between them shatter on his linoleum floor. The gravity of his words pulls him further down still, until he’s curled up in a ball, cheek to the floor, tears leaking uncontrollably down his face. He holds his own face in his hands, hating himself even more as each word he said rolls through his mind for a second time.

He doesn’t know how long he lays there before he hears a soft voice behind him. “Derek, sit up.” Derek has never heard three words spoken so tenderly, and he turns to see Stiles crouching next to him, face open and vulnerable, waiting for him to listen. Derek does as he says, not bothering to stop crying as he leans his back against the kitchen cabinets. 

“Now you know that I’m just as broken as all of the dead people in this house,” he laughs bitterly.

Stiles carefully sits next to him. “Why are you crying?” He asks.

“My sister,” Derek says in a hoarse whisper. “I said horrible things to her.”

Stiles reaches his hand out to Derek, but his fingertips just pass through Derek’s thigh. He sighs and turns his body towards Derek. Derek tugs his knees to his chest, hugging them. “Derek. It’s not your fault.”

Derek looks at the ghost. “Of course it is,” he says. “I made the choice to say those awful words. I _blamed_ her.”

Stiles shakes his head, gentle as ever. “I heard every word, Derek. Never once did you blame her. You asked her why she left you. You expressed how much it hurt you that she wasn’t there. You demanded the answers you deserve,” he explains.

Derek somehow cries harder, pressing his eyes into his kneecaps. “I shouldn’t have asked anything of her. She came here for help,” he whispers. 

Stiles is painfully forgiving as he leans into Derek. The familiar tingling that accompanies the touch of a ghost overtakes the right side of his body. “You had to let out that anger to be able to let it go,” Stiles says. “And believe me, I know anger.” He pauses. “You’re allowed to be angry, Derek.”

“Everyone left me,” Derek says, not meaning to. “Even her. Even Laura.”

“It’s your choice if you want to let her into your life,” Stiles says, patient. “And I don’t want you to feel like you need to make a decision, but I have a feeling you’ll have to make that decision soon.”

Derek doesn’t have to drive very far before he sees her car again. Whenever their family went on a road trip, they would always stop at every scenic view sign they could find. They would take pictures and stretch and spend time appreciating beautiful things. California has quite a few, and she’s at the first one outside of Beacon Hills. 

“I always wondered how it could have been different,” she says as he approaches. “What if the fire never happened. What if I didn’t run to South America. What if we had an adult that survived with us. I guess I got so caught up in the fantasy that I never considered what it would be like if I stayed. Leaving seemed like the only option.”

Derek stays silent, moving to the viewing spot beside her, leaning against the precarious makeshift railing.

“I still can’t talk about it.” She looks at Derek. “And I don’t want to.” She closes her eyes. “Can we...can we just get to know each other again? Be brother and sister?” She looks back out at the view. “I’m so tired of being alone,” Cora whispers.

Derek can relate to the feeling. He looks at his little sister again. She has so much of Laura in her. He can see Talia if he squints. It feels like his chest is being continually ripped open and sewn back together, over and over. He wonders if he’ll ever be able to look at her without feeling physical pain.

“I can’t promise anything,” he says. “I don’t think I’ll ever heal.”

“Me neither,” she’s quick to say.

“Okay,” Derek looks back out at the view. It truly is beautiful. Mountains of varying colors, endless trees. A sky that’s trying to rival heaven. He wonders if their parents are watching them. If Laura would put her hand on his shoulder comfortingly and remind him that forgiveness is harder than bitterness, but worth less regret later on.

“Okay,” Cora says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Songs:  
> [Blue Bucket of Gold](https://youtu.be/erqpdc9W8F8) by Sufjan Stevens: Cora looking for the forgiveness she's been craving for 10 years. She knows Derek's right. She just wants to move on some day.
> 
> [Walter Reed](https://youtu.be/JJVcop7au2M) by Michael Penn: Derek feels alone. Can you blame him?

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed this small tidbit! I still have more pre-written, and it will be posted sometime next week. I will try to stick to a weekly update, so we'll see! Let me know if you enjoyed, I respond to all comments!
> 
> POSSIBLE TRIGGERS:  
> Self-loathing, ghost encounters, afterlife conversation


End file.
